Girls' Night Out
The chaos continues! Kat wants to take the girls out for a day shopping... but clearly something's going to go wrong. Oh, and doesn't Kat have parents? It's probably about time we talked about them. '' Girls' Night Out is the second Chapter of Reincarnate: The World is Breaking. Cast of Characters *Girls' Night Out **Kat Murray **April Opal Joy **"Jemma Yuna" (???? Johnson) **Annie Anitho *Unknown "Girls' Night Out" The sun beat down relentlessly upon Camp Half-Blood, and Jemma thanked her lucky stars that the Dining Pavilion was roofed. This way, the new girl could eat her lunch socially uncomfortably without the added drama of physical discomfort. Jemma sat at the very edge of the Apollo table, as far away from her supposed half-siblings as possible. She stared away from the crowd and out into the beautiful-as-always view of her home. Except this wasn't her home. Not yet, anyway. Jemma was grateful that the Questers were eating lunch in their cabin today with Percy and Annabeth. The last thing she needed was to see unfamiliar familiar faces on a beautiful day like this. She really was trying not to think about Home, but it was hard. How do you keep yourself from thinking about something when you're living in a 3D fascimile of it? But if Jemma was going to set things right, she'd need to suffer through several necessary evils. Speaking of necessary evils.... ''Nausea mounted in Jemma when she thought of the only person who knew who she really was. Natalyia, the psychotic, bloodthirsty, manipulative girl from another dimension who was now Jemma's only ally in this new world. Jemma remembered the manila envelope, with its one, ominous word still resting under her pillow in the Apollo cabin. She'd been so busy debriefing with Kat Murray, April Joy, Henry and Oliver Ernest, and Henry Daniels after the cruise ship/lack of Mist mission that she'd lucked into being a part of that she hadn't had time to follow up on Natalyia's lead. And even if she had found time, where would Jemma have begun? The one word clue had been a lot of things, (annoying, ominous, frustrating beyond human comprehension) but clear was not one of them. Jemma yelped and almost had a heart attack as someone tapped her shoulder. Choking on her burger, she grabbed a fork and automatically held it out as a feeble weapon as she whirled around to face...Kat? The mortal girl raised her hands, a glimmer of amusement in her eyes. April Joy laughed, and Jemma realized Kat was standing next to the daghter of Selene and somebody who Jemma had never seen before in her life. "Gods, Kat." Jemma put down the fork, her face burning. "You nearly gave me an aneurysm." "Somebody's skittish today." April observed brightly, taking a seat next to Jemma on the stone bench. "And apparently somebody's also on Batman mode. Is there a reason why you're not interacting with your cabin?" Jemma shrugged, turning back to her food as Kat and the strange girl slid in the seat across from her. "I can relate to that." The new girl sighed, her brown eyes filled with sympathy. "I have nothing in common with all the other Hermes kids. They're all 'I'm going to rob you in your sleep' kinds of guys. I guess I took after the hospitality part of Hermes because I cannot lie for the life of me. Or at least, that's what Emily says." "Emily?" Jemma raised an eyebrow. "It's her cat." Kat murmured to Jemma. "Humor her." "Right." Jemma tried not to stare at Annie like she belonged in a rubber room. "That's... nice." "This is Annie Anitho, one of my best friends from THO." Jemma's heart dropped. She felt her face go white, and made an effort to keep it stoic. "I think it would be good for you to get to know the other Apollo's!" Annie continued, stopping short as she noticed Jemma's expression. "Jemma? You okay? You look like you just saw a ghost." ''Something like that... ''Jemma faked a smile. "I'm fine, guys. It's just been a kind of exhausting week." "And that's why we're here..." April cut in, excitement clear in her voice. "Kat got permission from Chiron and THO for us to take the day off!" "That's great." Jemma couldn't keep the skepticism out of her voice. "So, what relaxing camp activity is today? Deranged Capture-the-Flag, or violent Climbing Wall fun?" "Oh, heck no." Kat burst out laughing. "We're not staying at Camp. We're going to drive out to a local mall." "Oh." Jemma was surprised at how appealing the notion sounded. "That's actually kind of awesome." "Yup." Kat nodded. "Finish eating and get dressed for the great Unknown!" "I don't..." Jemma's face went red. "I don't exactly have anything fancy." "You'll be fine." Kat reassured her. "C'mon, we'll meet you at the trucks in the next ten minutes." Kat slid out of the table, "Don't be late!" Annie and April gave her one last smile and followed her. Jemma smiled despite herself. She kept on smiling as she finished her meal, and headed down to her cabin to change. It was only once Jemma had pulled on ehr nicest hoodie and jeans that she remembered that she didn't belong here. She wished she could forget that she didn't really belong anywhere. A while later, Jemma, April, Annie, and Kat were walking out of Hollister. "I don't know why we went in there." Jemma half-shouted. "The lines were too long, the clothes were too expensive, and the music was too loud." "The shirtless guys everywhere was weird and unnecessary." Annie complained. "How do they advertise tops?" "You guys seriously like to complain." Kat laughed. "At least you didn't have a Quest. Stella and Rachel won't be particularly happy when they learned they missed this little outing. Of course..." A frown crossed her face. "It's not like Rachel doesn't steal my clothes anyway." "Ha ha ha!" Jemma, Kat, and Annie turned, curious, towards April's weirdly high-pitched and tight laugh. "This has been such a wonderful outing. So free of danger or eventful moments! Oopsie!" April pretended to trip and grabbed onto Kat's shoulder. She murmured into her ear. "Stalker, 4 o'clock." The four girls turned. Despite the throng of people, they immediately recognized their adversary. Whoever it was marched jerkily and purposefully through the crowd towards them, their build and head obscured by the thick ski coat with its hood up. "A ski coat..." Annie frowned. "Inside?" "You've got to be joking." Kat grumbled, pulling her axe out of her messenger bag. "It's been like what, ten minutes? That's a new record, even for us." "Aren't you a mortal?" Jemma frowned. "Monsters can't smell you." "Which is funny." April murmured. "Because it's looking straight at Kat." The three girls glanced back and forth between the stranger and Kat. April was right- the hood was angled right at the mortal. While they'd been talking, the stalker had stopped walking. Now it just stared. "Okay..." Kat hefted the hammer and cracked her neck. "So, we gonna hit this thing or what?" "They're playing it safe." Jemma observed breathlessly. "Whoever it is seems to be keeping to the crowd. They know we're at a disadvantage among people." "Because my bronze affects mortals." Kat recalled. "Okay, new plan." The hero tried to look upbeat. "Maybe it just wants to talk?" Faster than any of them could react, the being leaped with superhuman strength and speed and tackled Kat. The two went flying over the railing into the foodcourt below and April yelped. "I don't think it wants to talk!" April observed as the three demigods ran for the stairs, and Jemma rolled her eyes. "You don't say." She exclaimed, retrieving the dagger Chiron had lent her from her boot as she leaped two steps at a time down the crowded steps. It had been all Kat could do to keep from breaking every bone in her body. Mid-fall, she had twisted around, ensuring that the hooded figure took the brunt of the crash into the tables below. Kat cursed herself as they rolled away from each other. In the heat of the moment, she hadn't gotten a good look at her enemy's face. And now the hood was back on again. Somehow, her enemy had already recovered, and had gotten to its feet with inhuman speed. It strolled towards her, apparently in no hurry. There was a twang, and two of April's arrows soared at the creature. They bounced off ineffectively. ''Armor, Kat thought to herelf as she hoisted herself to her feet. She scanned the cafeteria. Other mortals stared curiously at her, unsure what to make of the Mist-filled scene. She saw her hammer, wedged in a soda machine in a McDonalds far away. She was out of toys. Annie and Jemma had gotten close enough to lash out with weapons, but the hooded figure didn't seem to feel the blows. He easily wrenched the knife out of Jemma's grip, hit her with the butt of it, and threw it towards April, splitting her bow in two. Kat tried to stumbled towards the strange being- she wasn't going to stand there and watch whatever kind of surprisingly strong/quiet monster this was kill her friends. But by this time it had disarmed Annie, and threw her right into Kat. The two went sprawling on the mall floor, and Kat tried not to think about the old french fry near her face. A strong hand grabbed Kat's shirt, and hoisted her up so she was staring right into the shadowy face of whoever this was. "Katherine Murray." The voice was deep and harsh. "This is your first warning." Kat tried to think of something witty to say, but in her concussed state the most she could manage was "Do I know you?" The thing pinned something to Kat and dropped her. She bit her tongue to keep the pain down. Whatever it was turned and walked away, casually pushing April to the ground when she tried to rush it. Kat woozily grabbed a nearby table and pulled herself weakly onto her feet. Her friends too, were pulling themselves up exhaustedly. The food court started clapping. "Yes," Kat smiled wryly and curtsied despite the pain. "This was a lovely performance of 'Kat gets owned by a very strong eskimo'." The food court returned to normal. Kat awkwardly managed to sit down at the nearby table, and collapsed onto it. "One day..." she moaned. "Did I miss something here?" Annie frowned as she and the others followed suit. "Why did that North Face model attack us?" "Maybe it's because he thinks I should buy parkas instead of scarves." Kat winced. "Maybe there's a clue in whatever he stuck on you." Jemma observed. Kat glanced down... the man had pinned a folded piece of paper to her chest. "There'd better." Kat grumbled, tearing it off her chest and unfolding it. Her eyes connected with the words, and the picture on it, and her heart froze. "Kat?" April stared anxiously at her frozen friend. "What's wrong." Kat quivered, placing the piece of paper on the table and sliding it towards the others. "Missing girl." Annie read aloud, before frowning and doing a doubletake. "Kat, this is you." "I know." Kat squeezed her eyes shut. "I know, I know, I know." "It says you've been missing since a few years ago." April read it over. "That's when you came to Camp." "Yeah, when I told Chiron I had parental permission to be at Camp/Olymus 365 days a year?" Kat murmured. "That might not've been 100% true." "It doesn't even look .005% true." Annie grimaced. "You ran away?" "I didn't run away." Kat looked devastated. "I gave my parents a fake field trip form to sign and took a train to Camp, and never returned." "Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's still classified under 'running away'." Jemma looked at her unsympathetically. "You're telling the orphans here that you have parents, and you abandoned them?" "I'm not an orphan." Annie offered. "I see my mother every now and again. We eat Chinese and watch Dancing With the Stars." "Look, guys." Kat blinked away tears. "I know this looks bad, but... look. You find out you're special, that there's another world out there you could be a part of, and you take that chance right? But my parents wouldn't have let me. They'd never send me off to be a part of a life-threatening lifestyle like this." "Ok." Annie mulled this over. "So, call them, and Mistify them into thinking its a school they like! Morally deplorable, sure, but at least they're not worrying." "My powers don't work on them." Kat drooped. "I don't know why, they just don't." There was silence at the table. "I don't agree with what you did." Jemma sighed. "But I'm not about to go running to Chiron about my friend's personal choice." "Thanks." Kat breathed a sigh of relief. "You don't know what this means to me." "You're going to have to go back eventually." April pointed out. "The police are going to catch your face, or an old friend of yours will see you in the background of their NYC selfies." "I know, I know." Kat shook her head. "But we'll cross that bridge when we get to it." The other girls shared a look. "Let's make a deal." April sighed. "We all pretend this never happened until it inevitably becomes a problem." "Why not?" Kat grinned. "I'm all for it." Shrugged Jemma. "The less emotional baggage on me the better." "Anything for a friend." Annie smiled, and stood up. "I'll go grab us some burgers." The hooded figure watched as they laughed and ate, her strong hand squeezing the remainder of the newspaper to pulp. "Don't worry, Mom and Dad." She whispered. "You're dear old daughter is coming home whether you want it or not." Next ''The Ernest Brothers take center stage! Who are they, and how do they fit into our little saga? Back to main page Category:BeholdtheVision Category:Reincarnate Category:Complete